In the following essay, Schmidt offers a reappraisal of “Breakfast,” contrasting the story with a similar passage found in Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath.

When John Steinbeck's The Long Valley was published in 1938—just a year before The Grapes of Wrath—it received a mixed critical reception, even though it contained several short stories which eventually came to be recognized as some of Steinbeck's masterpieces. The volume included “The Chrysanthemums,”“Flight,”“The Snake,” and the three short stories that make up The Red Pony. Yet reviewers gave scant praise to these. Eda Walton, writing for The Nation, noted that Steinbeck's “stories are competent...